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Students joining battle to upend laws on voter ID

By Matt ApuzzoNew York Times

Posted:
07/05/2014 12:01:00 AM CDT

Updated:
07/05/2014 08:32:17 PM CDT

WASHINGTON -- Civil rights groups have spent a decade fighting voter identification laws, arguing that they discriminate against African-Americans, Hispanics and the poor. This week in a North Carolina courtroom, another group will make its case that such laws are discriminatory: college students.

Joining a challenge to a state law alongside the NAACP, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Justice Department, lawyers for seven college students and three voter-registration advocates are making the novel constitutional argument that the law violates the 26th Amendment, which lowered the voting age to 18 from 21. The amendment also declares that the right to vote "shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state on account of age."

There has never been a case like it, and if the students succeed, it will open another front in what has become a highly partisan battle over voting rights. Over the past decade, Republicans have campaigned to tighten voter rules in the name of preventing fraud. Democrats have countered that the real purpose of those laws is to make voting more difficult for people who are likely to vote Democratic.

"There's an unprecedented effort nationally by Republican-controlled legislatures to restrict the franchise in a way we haven't seen in a long time," said Marc Elias, the Democratic election lawyer bringing the age-discrimination claim. "Young voting in particular is a part of that effort.

Under the North Carolina law passed last year, the period for early voting was shortened and same-day registration was eliminated. Beginning in 2016, voters will need to show photo identification, and student ID cards -- including those issued by state universities -- will not be acceptable. In most instances, neither will an out-of-state driver's license.

The law also eliminated a program in which teenagers filled out their voter-registration forms early and were automatically registered when they turned 18.

"For people like me, it makes what should be a simple process very difficult," said Josue Berduo, 20, an economics major at North Carolina State University and a Democrat who is one of the plaintiffs.

Multiple lawsuits against North Carolina, including the age-discrimination case, have been combined into one. A hearing Monday is over whether to delay the law until a judge can decide whether it is constitutional.

Berduo, who is from Asheville, North Carolina, has a state ID card. But many students do not, he said, and no matter how much attention the law gets, some students will be unaware of the changes and will arrive at polling places carrying out-of-state licenses or student ID cards.

Jeff Tarte, a Republican state senator who supported the voter-ID law, said lawmakers did not intend to keep younger voters away from the polls. He said they were trying to prevent students from submitting absentee ballots in their home states and also voting in North Carolina.

"Not that they would necessarily," he said, "but why even offer that possibility to occur?"